Election Day is approaching, and the campuses at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and Marquette University are awash in a typical mix of activism and apathy. With help from correspondents Tyler Casey (UWM) and Heather Leszczewicz (Marquette), OnMilwaukee.com takes the political temperature of the biggest campuses in town.
UWM
Are you registered to vote? Really? Are you sure?
Maybe you should check again. If not, the New Voter's Project will get you registered to cast a vote -- even if you're already a registered voter and told them of this. Twice. It's hard to miss them, with their table outside the UWM Union food court that features a cutout of a giant naked Uncle Sam, but if not, these dope pushers of democracy will find you and remind you to vote. Even if you re-route your walk to class so as not to go through the Union, they'll find and remind you.
You can also tell we're gearing up for an election by a quick check of the ground beneath your feet. On any given day you'll find someone's ideology scribbled in sidewalk chalk on the concrete of Spaights Plaza. Last week it was a couple dozen messages telling people to vote no on the proposed marriage amendment. Who knows what important issue will be presented in the same way as a four-square game as election time grows closer? Perhaps a complex breakdown of the capital punishment referendum will surface on a hopscotch board.
UWM has also seen appearances from ideologues and even some candidates. Innocence Project founder Barry Schenk urged people to vote no on the death penalty referendum, Green Party gubernatorial candidate Nelson Eisman urged people to vote for him, and former Democratic candidate for Secretary of State Scot Ross walked around the dorms for a little bit with a TV camera following him.
Most of the political figures that have come to campus have been left leaning, as might be expected of a public university in a major city. But according to student/blogger Bradley Wooten (http://bradleywooten.blogspot.com/), Republican gubernatorial candidate Mark Green was invited, along with Gov. Jim Doyle, to come to a student forum. After initially saying he was excited about the idea, Green eventually backed out after talking to Doyle's campaign. Maybe he didn't want to scuff up his shoes with purple sidewalk chalk.
For all the commotion, one would hardly be able to tell that this is only a midterm election. Midterm elections generally have lower voter turnouts than in presidential election years. College students also don't tend to vote in large numbers, anyway. Only 22 percent of young adults voted in the previous midterm election in 2002. If that number holds up this year and is extrapolated throughout UWM's student body, that's around 6,000 students who will actually vote (not counting older students, who tend to vote more than 18-25 year olds).
That leaves 22,000 students, give or take a few hundred, for whom the register zombies, the sidewalk chalk and the guest speakers will ultimately leave no impression. But for now, UWM as a campus at least gives the appearance of caring. In the end, that's probably all that matters. When the polls open November 7 and most students are busy not voting, at least it won't be for a lack of effort at UWM.
MARQUETTE
College is often considered a time of "political awakening." Marquette's students have taken to political positions at the campus and state levels while moving into other mediums including a newspaper and blogs. In 2005, Marquette made national news when university officials shut down a table for Adopt-a-Sniper, but most of the political activity on campus carries a lower profile.
"Students form their own opinions and convictions in high school. But it is not until college that students are in an environment to test those beliefs and see how they measure up in a room full of views contrary to their own," Mary Ellen Burke, state chair of the Wisconsin Federation of College Republicans as well as a Marquette senior, says. "Most important, college students are of voting age, which gets them thinking about elections from a hands-on perspective."
